The expanding service economy demands an increasing supply of low-wage workers who, increasingly, are women and racial minorities. At the same time that women are being pulled into these low-paying and often inflexible and unstable jobs, reforms in the welfare system have removed the economic safety net for many women and children. This paper relies on in-depth interviews with rural low-income mothers in a midwestern state to examine the importance of the context of working conditions in shaping job turnover. In the often brittle and unyielding conditions of the low-wage, primarily service work available in one rural county, "breaks"-either by quitting or losing a job-are not an uncommon occurrence. I argue that within the context of these low-wage service jobs, which offer employees little autonomy, quitting may be one of the only forms of resistance available to workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]